Hillcrest-Tuscaloosa Coach Scott Suttles leaps in the air in frustration during Sparkman's AHSAA 6A Northwest Regional basketball game with Hillcrest-Tuscaloosa, Wednesday, February 20, 2013, at Tom Drake Coliseum in Hanceville, Ala. (Vasha Hunt/vhunt@al.com)

HANCEVILLE, Alabama -- When the games are over, each bench usually has a different take on the outcome of each Alabama High School Athletic Association's state basketball tournament.

That's the norm, but that wasn't the case after Sparkman's 48-41 victory against Hillcrest-Tuscaloosa in a Class 6A boys regional semifinal on Wednesay at Wallace State.

Both teams pointed to the job Sparkman did defending Hillcrest's Rayshawn Tubbs.

"They just did a fabulous job on Tubbs," Hillcrest-Tuscaloosa coach Scott Suttles said. "He's our leading scorer. That was the difference right there."

Tubbs had just eight points against the Senators. He only made 3 of his 11 attempts from the floor.

"Defense was so important for us in this win," Sparkman senior Devin Hankins said. "Especially Jason Russell on our team. He had to guard their key player and he shut them down. I don't think that guy scored in double digits. That's the key point. We'd been stressing defense and guarding that guy all week. He did a real good job."

Sparkman got a balanced effort. Hankins had 10 points. Lamonte Turner had 10. The Senators were led by Justin Garrett's 12 points.

Hillcrest (23-9) was led by D.J. Johnson's 10 points. Both teams shot 41 percent from the field. The difference can be measured in slight increments.

"Basketball is a game of runs," Sparkman coach Jamie Coggins said. "When there is a run you just kind of want to stop that bleeding. You've got to make a shot. You've got to get to the free throw line. You've got to get one stop. You just make one play and that one play is sometimes the turning point.

The Senators had six more rebounds than Hillcrest. Perhaps the biggest difference was Sparkman made 7 of 16 from three-point land. The Patriots missed eight of their nine shots from that distance.

Suttles measured his end-of-season words carefully. He focused on how far his boys came instead of how they fell short. He felt this was one of the most, if not the most, improved teams he's had at Hillcrest.

"55 days ago we lost a game by 30 points where we scored 25 points in a game and had a running clock on us," Suttles said. "To say that we have progressed incredibly would be the understatement of the decade. But I've always believed in them."

That put him at peace with the result.

"When push comes to shove Sparkman is just a little bit better than us," Suttles said. "Its just that simple but I'm proud as a peacock of these guys and these five seniors."

Sparkman will now move on to face Hazel Green on Friday in the Class 6A regional finals. The Senators are 3-0 against them this season, but the thought looms about how hard it is to beat a good team for the fourth time this season.

That degree of difficulty is amplified considering this junction of the Class 6A bracket.

"Hazel Green has a little size on us but I think they have some matchup issues with us because we play primarly with guards," Coggins said. "So they have to guard us and I think that creates matchup problems for them. In the games leading up to the area championship game, we pretty much played straight-up with them. That last game we played we might have shown a new wrinkle and in this next one I think we might show another wrinkle or two. I just think you have to have a new agenda or two in there when you play a time for the third and fourth time."

Jeff Sentell covers Birmingham high school sports for The Alabama Media Group and The Birmingham News. Write to him at jsentell@al.com.